I Caught You Looking
by BluX
Summary: Akuroku. Roxas meets a fire-haired stranger during his second year of college. Will Roxas explore a new relationship or will everything come crashing down around him? Read/Review please! Story in progress. Thanks for reading!
1. I Caught You Looking Ch 1

First off, in no way do I own any character associated with this story.

With that out of the way, I'll continue to say that this is my first serious Akuroku fanfic so take it easy on me, alright? As always, please review when you're done reading. I really do appreciate it!

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I Caught You Looking  
Chapter 1

"Yeah, see ya tomorrow!" I call back to the librarians who are still closing up the giant campus library, waving goodbye as I reposition my backpack a little more center on my shoulders and walk out the double glass doors and into the courtyard of Radiant Garden University. I'd already double-checked the list for closing the small coffee shop I work at, located conveniently inside the large library.

The biting cold weather that greeted me outside those glass doors was never a surprise but stunned the senses nonetheless. I started the tedious walk back to my apartment, following along the bricked wall of the library.

It was bordering on 11pm so the night was fully settled in and all the street lights were glowing softly in the dark. The clouds hadn't dissipated all day so the stars weren't visible. I could hear traffic still buzzing even though I couldn't see the intersection of the busiest street in the University district. I round the corner of the library to step on the sidewalk that will take me to the stoplight; I look up and spot someone already waiting at the intersection.

Who the hell would be out this late? Oh wait, I would… Probably some student that was in the library. Whatever. The guy's pretty tall and actually quite thin. I can see his breath puffing out of the pulled up hood as he leans against the stoplight pole with his hands jammed deep in his zip-up black hoodie pockets. Not much clothing for cold weather like this.

The light is still the wrong color for us to cross and traffic is a steady stream, even at a late hour like this. This is the only traffic light I have to cross on my way home. Follow a sidewalk to the edge of the University district and turn right to cross over to the Tulip Blue district.

Big surprise, a place like this having districts named after fucking flowers. Tulip Blue, Buttercup Yellow, Violet Purple, Lily White, of course Rose Red, and some other flowers that nobody cares to remember. Rarely do you ever hear someone refer to the districts has flowers, they just drop it and call it by color. I live on the border of the RGU district and Blue District, the area to the immediate east of campus. Nothing special about it other than it borders Yellow, Green, and Purple Districts.

As soon as I walk up to the intersection the crosswalk light turns white and the stranger steps away from the pole to start walking across the street. I follow close behind.

I look up at the strangers back and finally notice a graphic on the back of his black, tight-fitting hoodie. It's a few different sized circles with sharp points radiating out from the center. Hmm, must be some sort of band logo or something. Now that I'm walking closer to him, I see that he's quite a bit taller than me, probably a full head taller. I glance again at the puffs of breath coming out from inside the hood of his jacket.

The guy continues along the same sidewalk as I'm heading. I look around and find no one else around, the lights in the campus library receding behind me. My luck that streetlights are few and far between on this particular street. A creeping nervousness settles in my stomach but I try to dismiss it as quickly as possible. The college is pretty moderately sized, not too big and definitely not too small, but not big enough to have shady characters hanging around it. Not a big enough city where people get mugged this close to the University. Still, little prickles start to poke at the back of my neck.

I recall the self-defense class I took last semester, struggling to remember all the moves and escapes I was rigorously tested on. Then I almost chuckle at myself; man, am I overreacting or what?

I see the guy turn his head to look across the street and I catch a glimpse of a defined nose, a crooked grin, and a sharp chin. He looks back ahead and starts to ruffle around in the front of his jacket. I hear a metallic cling and a few quick rasping sounds, then the breaths of cold that I see coming out of the black hood don't disappear so quickly. Also, a hot cinnamon smell floats my way.

Then it's a big puff of smoke that blasts me in the face as the guy breaths out, just my luck the wind is picking it up and throwing it right at me. The dude lit up a cigarette right in front of me. I try to hold it back but I let out a few choking coughs that I'm sure he heard. Who couldn't have? I bet he thinks I'm some kind of jerk or something. I hear him make some sort of noise but it's too soft and low for me to hear.

I see the lower half of his face appear again as he turns his head only now there's an odd colored cigarette propped between his lips, the perfect cylinder dangerously close to falling out of his mouth. There's a larger crooked grin on his lips now. Defenses up as I think of all the ways the guy can turn on me and totally kill/mug my ass.

"Didn't know somebody was back there."

He speaks perfectly even though he's got a burning stick perched between his lips.

"Sorry 'bout that."

Err…what was I thinking? This guy's voice is something different in the silence of the outlying houses of the RGU district, oddly distracting me. Somehow the tone of it fits the physical look of him. I finally notice the bounce in his step, my mind immediately switches back to the defensive.

He casually steps off the sidewalk into somebody's lawn and slows down. My steps almost stutter, what's he doing? I keep walking and he takes in stride behind me. What the hell? Now my hands are sweating in my pockets and I can feel my nerves prickling. I know he's looking me over.

"There." Sounds almost like a sigh. I can hear him take a long drag on his cigarette and slowly breathe out. Dammit, dammit. Why tonight? Why do I have to be mugged tonight? I try to speed up my steps a little to put some distance between me and this guy.

Wait, what was that thing in defense class. Get a good look at your attacker, look at his face, look him in the eyes. Get all the information you can about him. Yes, yes. Turn around and face him. Go for the balls, punch in the face. Get him on the ground and run like the wind in the opposite direction. Back to campus, call the police. Yeah. Don't go home. Don't let him know where you live. But first, look him in the-

Right then I turned to get a good look at his face and was more surprised than I'd ever been. The guy had looked a little too thin from behind but from the front he was just right for his height. His face was hidden a little by the hood but as he inhaled on the cigarette it lit up his face. Two of the most keen and brilliantly green eyes looked up through lashes directly at me.

…and suddenly my feet aren't touching the ground.

And then I'm staring straight up at the gloomy almost-midnight sky when a shadowy face pokes into my range of sight. It's the guy that was following me, still with the cigarette dangling from his lips as he's bent at the waist, looking right down at me, his hands still buried in his jacket pockets. I swear if he drops that cigarette on me I'm going to be the one beating him, not vice versa.

"Nice trip."

He's just standing there looking at me with that crooked grin on his face.

"You alright, kid?"

My first unconscious thought is how I'm no kid.

As I'm struggling to get up a hand is thrust in my face. I ignore it and brush off my pants. Please no grass stains, I pray. This guy shrugs me off and shoves his hand right back in its home in his pocket. Whatever, I'm still trying to push down the blush coming to my face. I can't believe I just tripped. I'm never that clumsy, but the look on the guys face was…

"You sure you're alright?"

I'm forced to look up at him because of my height. He's still grinning at me. Is that supposed to be a mocking grin? There's something on his face, right below his gleaming eyes. Whatever…

"I'm fine." I'm not about to get embarrassed in front of a stranger. He won't even remember my face. The back of my mind has a comeback though: but you'll remember his face, won't you.

No, I won't. I'll forget it as soon as I get back to my apartment tonight.

Before he has time to respond I'm already on my way. I don't even bother to glance back at him but I can't hear his footsteps so I know he's not following me. After walking a few more blocks I look behind me and all I see is the far off stoplight switch from red to green.

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Ah, mysterious stranger! I'm sure you all know who it is. XD Anyway, please feel free to leave me a review. Anything will suffice really, a note on what you think or perhaps a serious criticism of my work. It really helps me out when I know what people think! Thanks a bunch for reading!


	2. I Caught You Looking Ch 2

Alright, not to confuse anyone but I switched from 1st person in the first chapter to 3rd person omniscient. It's hard for me to keep up 1st person so I just switched it. Hope it doesn't effect your reading of this chapter. Anyway, enough rambling, please enjoy!

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I Caught You Looking  
Chapter 2

Roxas glanced at the clock, he'd only been in class for 40 minutes but already he felt like he'd grown roots into his desk. The clock hands glared down on him, almost pointing angry fingers for getting impatient when he had another 40 minutes of class to endure. His professor paced back and forth while rambling about the significance of some famous speech to some people that roused them into revolution or something rather. He'd stopped listening about 10 minutes into class and instead started to scribble in the margins of his notes, a habit he tried to break in Twilight Town High but never really succeeded. He was currently filling in some black squares of a checkerboard print across the top corner of his notes, right above a cluster of stars and a horribly misshapen crescent moon.

The teacher coughed a little and Roxas only looked up to make sure he wasn't being stared at or anything. When the professor resumed his lecture, the blonde went right back to scribbling. The desks around him weren't occupied and the guy two desks down was absolutely napping while sitting up, a little hunched over with his chin almost touching his chest. Roxas absently doodled some circles together and a thought flashed through his head like lightning. He looked down to see a familiar symbol.

It was a few rings intersecting, and just for detail, Roxas added some rays out from the center of the largest circle. It was a crude drawing but the back of his mind registered the general shape of it. The way it was laid out looked a little lopsided but he could recognize the symbol that was on the back of the stranger from yesterday night.

A blush came to Roxas' face and his chest squeezed a little in embarrassment when he remembered how he'd tripped and fallen like a total idiot in front of the guy. Then he inwardly shook his head, scolding himself for being embarrassed. He probably was never going to see the guy again so why even worry about it. But even with the scolding, Roxas still wondered if they guy thought of him as a complete loser for tripping and falling on his own feet.

Roxas absently traced around the circular symbol a few more times while remembering what had occurred just last night. He recalled the smell of cinnamon for some reason and bright beaming green eyes. The thought of how slender and tall the other guy had been made Roxas almost jealous.

The little blonde hadn't grown much since high school, his stature only inches taller. He didn't feel like a child but regardless, he felt like he still looked like one. His ocean blue eyes remained the same, if not a little wiser for wear, almost always in a frown or scowl. His choice of clothing hadn't changed much; checker board print remained his vise. He'd gotten rid of his kid-ish looking clothes and shoes, picking more close fitting and simplistic clothing and a pair of black and white sneakers. Roxas couldn't bring himself to get rid of his checkerboard wristband and his black and white rings which he wore every day no matter what his wardrobe threw at him.

The professor cleared his throat again, drawing Roxas' attention for a moment. Yet again, only looking up to check and see if he was the center of a question that he hadn't even heard. The napping guy next to him stirred a little but settled back again, wrapping his arms a little closer around himself and falling back asleep. Roxas went back to doodling and realized he'd drawn several more of the circular symbols in varying sizes in the margins of his notes while he'd been in self-reflection.

Roxas scribbled through one of symbols, resigned to the thought that he'd never see that creepy-ass guy ever again. No need to dwell on the thought but his mind couldn't leave it alone, asking stupid questions that he didn't care to know the answers to. Did the guy go to college? He looked a little old, but Roxas had learned that age wasn't easily divined in college, even the girls who looked younger were actually seniors getting their last credits to graduate. Besides, Roxas had only seen the slight illumination of the guy's face from a cigarette, who could determine age from that feeble of a light?

Roxas snapped back to the present and looked up at the clock when he heard people zipping up their book bags. It was already 11:20. Had he zoned out that badly that the last 40 minutes had flown by that quickly? Apparently so.

"Remember, test on Thursday. I'll see all of you then." The professor shuffled some papers and shoved them into his briefcase, waiting for all the students to file out of the room.

Roxas glanced once more at the scribbled out symbol as he flipped his notebook closed and picked up his books, dropping them into his book bag. He'd probably never see that guy again, not that it bothered him much.

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Roxas munched on a turkey sandwich while scanning the college cafeteria. It was packed, as usual. He couldn't help but notice how different it was than the cafeteria at his old high school. For some reason a cloud of maturity hovered around in this place, unlike the clutter and loudness of his younger years at middle school and such.

Naminé was sitting across the table from him, her blonde hair shining in the dim light of the day. The clouds from yesterday hadn't dissipated quite yet and cast a gloomy light through the solid wall of paned glass that made up one whole side of the cafeteria. The porcelain-skinned girl shuffled through some papers on the table and went back to drawing on her dog-eared sketch pad.

Beside her sat Pence, still overweight as always, playing a portable videogame, his overly long brown hair slumping into his face without the headband he'd gotten rid of as soon as they'd all come to college. Olette sat to the right of Roxas eating a bright red apple, her eyes sparking at a joke that Pence had just told while pausing his game.

Roxas let his eyes wander out the window to his immediate left, letting the din of voices in the large room sink in and turn to ambient noise. The gardens of the campus were right below him, sprawling into a large courtyard that all the campus buildings were constructed around. The splendor of the place in spring, summer, and fall was something you had to see with your own eyes, the magnificence of color was never caught well in photos or words. Yet, now the place was only green coming out of winter, all the buds hiding until the frosts were over.

"Hey guys!" A large tattoo flashed up from the collar of Hayner's jacket coat as he scooted into a chair at the head of the table, his blonde waves smoothed back from his face like always. Roxas could remember going to the tattoo house when Hayner had gotten the huge design that crept up his neck and extended down to his elbow. Olette had pretty much had a cow but the thing had healed so well that the tattoo looked as much a part of the guy as his coffee-colored eyes.

Roxas allowed himself to zone out as always when his friends started to gossip and chatter like always. Leaning back in his chair, his blue eyes stared unfocused out at the gray clouds hanging overhead. Roxas wondered what color you could classify the eyes of that guy from the other night. They weren't even a color you could find in the gardens during the best bloom of the year-

Roxas felt a prickle and looked up to see Naminé staring at him. She quickly looked back down at her art pad and scribbled away desperately with a completely unreadable expression on her pale face. Her hand fluttering over the surface of the paper that was tilted toward her on the lip of the table.

Naminé had always been mysterious like that. She didn't talk much but her voice was always like a transparent cloud and her smiles, whenever they emerged through her blank stare, were always brighter than the sun. Roxas could stomach her company longer than anyone else's simply because she was so reserved. His other three friends had leaned further together and continued to chatter away, barely realizing that Roxas was even sitting at their table. Roxas resumed his staring out the window but as soon as his mind started to wonder he heard an almost inaudible voice.

"Someone is on your mind." Roxas started and looked up to see Naminé looking at him through her lashes. A quick glance told Roxas that none of the others had heard her. He looked at her straight in the eye and saw no clear emotion there.

"What makes you say that?" Roxas leaned forward on his chair again. Naminé's shrug barely registered through her slight shoulders, she laid her drawing pad on the table and flipped it around so Roxas could see. She never took her eyes away from Roxas'.

The blonde boy saw his hands grasp out toward the pad of paper and bring it close. It was a very accurate pencil sketch of himself from the chest up. His chin raised slightly up and to the left and his eyes staring off through the window. She had just sketched this in the last few minutes and it already looked like it was a finished piece.

"Your eyes," she said softly. Roxas looked up to see she was still staring at him but her expression was different.

Right then Olette decided to take her attention away from her conversation with the others to look at Naminé's drawing and exclaim, "Oh, Naminé! That's awesome! Did you do that just now?"

Naminé snatched her pad away and gazed thoughtfully at Olette, "Yes, thank you."

"You're so awesome at that stuff. I wish I could draw as well as you," Olette pushed the conversation, her dainty lips curling into a flattering smile.

Naminé gazed at Roxas the whole time Olette was talking with that unreadable look on her face making the blonde boy thoroughly uncomfortable. How did Naminé know what he'd been thinking about? She was so cryptic and stoic all the time. Roxas recalled the faraway look in his eyes from her drawing. Is that was he really looked like?

With a sigh he pushed away from the table and collected his book bag, "See you guys." This was no time to get sentimental.

He stalked away from the table amidst everyone sending him goodbyes as well. Roxas couldn't help one last sideways glance at Naminé who was back to work sketching like mad on another drawing like always.

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Alright, hope you all like the layout of this chapter. Let me know what you thought of it so drop me a review. Like I always say, it really gets me motivated to write and let's me know what the masses want with one of my stories when people review so spend a second or two writing me something. Anything! Thanks for taking the time to read my story this far as well.


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